Soldier retreats to Ur breaking nice statuette (8)
I believe the answer is:
figurine
'statuette' is the definition.
(synonyms)
'soldier retreats to ur breaking nice' is the wordplay.
'soldier' becomes 'GI' (GI can mean a US soldier).
'retreats' says the letters should be written in reverse (I've seen 'retreat' mean this).
'breaking' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'nice' becomes 'fine' (I've seen this before).
'gi' written backwards gives 'ig'.
'ig'+'ur'='igur'
'igur' inserted into 'fine' is 'FIGURINE'.
(Other definitions for figurine that I've seen before include "Small statue" , "Fine rug I change for a small carved body" , "Statuette" , "moulded object" , "Small piece of sculpture" .)